"let's stay together 'till we're ghosts"

That lyric is from the Drake song "Fireworks", the song isn't one of my favorites but it's catchy and I love that line.

Check me out, posting twice in one month! March is almost over and we're barely over a quarter of the way into the semester; the students are having such a tough time staying motivated, especially since learning that the course (2 semesters) is only worth 1 credit. Of course, I'm still learning as I go, constantly going back through my TEFL textbook and noticing stuff, being reminded of things I should work on improving.

We (as foreign teachers) have kinda been bucking against the administration because of how restricted our travel is--technically, we can't travel Monday through Friday, even though not one of us teaches every day of the week. We're going to see about getting that fixed next year in the contract, because if they expect us to travel during the national holidays when every Chinese citizen travels, they are crazy.

In more exciting news, there are trips on the horizon. First, tomorrow some of the teachers are heading south to the Hunan Botanical Garden, where the cherry blossoms are supposed to be in season. Next month, on Easter weekend, Amy and I will be going to Chengdu where we plan on holding pandas! Finally, my mom and Keenan are very close to buying their tickets to come visit me this summer! I haven't hit major trip planning mode yet, but we will be hitting at least 5 cities as of now in 2 weeks, including Beijing where I will at last get to see the Great Wall. If pandas go well next month, we'll be heading out that way, because that's what they really want to do.

To close, I would like to put in a plug for mine and my friends' Flickr accounts, where you can see our photos from all over the world. I am at www.flickr.com/photos/meimei09/ , and Jason and Katie are at www.flickr.com/photos/28398373@N07/ and www.flickr.com/photos/katiea48/ , respectively. Jason takes pictures of all the food we eat, and he has really nice camera equipment. Enjoy, and check often!

approaching the 7-month-iversary

I've always been a winter girl, but living in Changsha is about to turn me into a summer one--even when I know summer means temps and humidity like Arkansas. Currently the weather is still a bit bipolar, and it's not quite warm enough all the time to warrant turning off the heaters, but I'll be glad when it is. On FB just now, I realized that lots of people are on Spring Break, which I had totally forgotten since my Spring (Festival) Break was a month ago.

Not that much is new here, I've been observed twice but we still haven't had a staff meeting. Amy and I tried one of the bars downtown for the first time this past weekend; it was okay, not many expat girls, mostly guys who just want to date Chinese girls. We found a group of people to talk to for the night, but they're all leaving this summer. My current dilemma is that Amy and Julianne, the only other twenty-something teachers, are leaving for good in July, and I don't know any other expats in town. I'm trying to get out and meet some, and hopefully the school will hire at least one other young person.

Anyone who has spent enough quality time with me knows that I am a Disney princess at heart (Belle, to be specific), and I was listening to some princess tunes the other day and caught this gem.

"I want adventure in the great wide somewhere, I want it more than I can tell
And for once it might be grand to have someone understand
I want so much more than they've got planned"

As I heard this bit from Beauty and the Beast, I remembered that I used to stand on my grandma's front lawn overlooking the pond and re-enact this scene from the movie--Belle runs out of the house and the wind is blowing and she throws her arms around...I used to know it by heart. And now, I'm doing it. Funny how life works out, isn't it?